Sensitivities of Numerical Model Forecasts of Extreme Cyclone Events

A global forecast model is used to examine various sensitivities of numerical predictions of three extreme winter storms that occurred near the eastern continental margin of North America: the Ohio Valley blizzard of January 1978, the New England blizzard of February 1978, and the Mid-Atlantic cyclone of February 1979. While medium-resolution simulations capture much of the intensification, the forecasts of the precise timing and intensity levels suffer from various degrees of error. The coastal cyclones show a 5-10 hPa dependence on the western North Atlantic sea surface temperature, which is varied within a range (± 2.5℃) compatible with interannual fluctuations. The associated vertical velocities and precipitation rates show proportionately stronger dependences on the ocean temperature perturbations. The Ohio Valley blizzard, which intensified along a track 700-800 km from the coast, shows little sensitivity to ocean temperature. The effect of a shift of - 10?latitude in the position of the snow boundary is negligible in each case. The forecasts depend strongly on the model resolution, and the coarse-resolution forecasts are consistently inferior to the medium-resolution forecasts. Studies of the corresponding sensitivities of extreme cyclonic events over eastern Asia are encouraged in order to identify characteristics that are common to numerical forecasts for the two regions.

Estimation of extreme wind speed in SCS and NWP by a non-stationary model

In offshore engineering design, it is considerably significant to have an adequately accurate estimation of marine environmental parameters, in particular, the extreme wind speed of tropical cyclone （TC） with different return periods to guarantee the safety in projected operating life period. Based on the 71-year （1945-2015） TC data in the Northwest Pacific （NWP） by the Joint Typhoon Warning Center （JTWC） of US, a notable growth of the TC intensity is observed in the context of climate change. The fact implies that the traditional stationary model might be incapable of predicting parameters in the extreme events. Therefore, a non-stationary model is proposed in this study to estimate extreme wind speed in the South China Sea （SCS） and NWP. We find that the extreme wind speeds of different return periods exhibit an evident enhancement trend, for instance, the extreme wind speeds with different return periods by non- stationary model are 4.1%-4.4% higher than stationary ones in SCS. Also, the spatial distribution of extreme wind speed in NWP has been examined with the same methodology by dividing the west sea areas of the NWP 0°-45°N, 105°E-130°E into 45 subareas of 5° × 5°, where oil and gas resources are abundant. Similarly, remarkable spacial in-homogeneity in the extreme wind speed is seen in this area： the extreme wind speed with 50-year return period in the subarea （15°N-20°N, 115°E-120°E） of Zhongsha and Dongsha Islands is 73.8 m/s, while that in the subarea of Yellow Sea （30°N-35°N, 120°E-125°E） is only 47.1 m/s. As a result, the present study demonstrates that non-stationary and in-homogeneous effects should be taken into consideration in the estimation of extreme wind speed.